The 10 Top Selling Cars in the World

At the end of the first quarter of 2014, the Corolla from Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM) was the best-selling car in the world. That is not exactly earth-shattering news because the Corolla has been the best-selling car for years. Toyota sold 276,766 Corollas in the first quarter, down 1.5% from the 280,969 the company sold in the same period a year ago.

It is also no shocker that the Focus from Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) held its spot at number two, with total first-quarter sales of 256,284, also down from last year’s total of 274,859. That is a sharper drop, totaling 6.8%.

The big surprise is that the Volkswagen Golf jumped from seventh place a year ago to third this year, with sales of 223,249 units, up 27.9% over a year ago. The fourth ranked best-seller was China’s Wuling Hongguang minivan, with sales of 210,109, a whopping 52.7% higher than a year ago. The Hyundai Elantra rounded out the top five.

General Motors Co. (NYSE: GM) barely squeaked into the top 10, with the Chevy Cruze selling 176,537 units, up 10.2% from a year ago. Toyota’s Camry placed ninth, the Volkswagen Polo ranked eighth and two more Ford models finished sixth and seventh, the F-Series pickups and the Ford Fiesta, respectively.

All told, Ford’s three top global sellers accounted for more than 640,000 units sold in the first three months of 2014, while GM’s top three sold less than 450,000, not counting GM’s partnership with China’s SAIC and Liuzhou Wuling Motors in building and selling the Wuling Hongguang.

A few other tidbits from the data compiled by focus2move:

The Toyota Prius sold 124,062 units, down from 142,820 a year ago (-13.1%).

The Ram pickup from Dodge sold 96,906 units, up 24.9% year-over-year.

The best-selling luxury car was the BMW 3 Series with sales of 113,015, up 15.6%.

Sales in the quarter rose 4.5% over a year ago, and a global total of 21.6 million units were sold in March.